Love List: YAs for Music Lovers

Here are some great YAs where music is front and center

It Goes Like This by Miel Moreland - I am endlessly annoying about how much I love this book and how you should read it if you loved Daisy Jones and the Six and I’m sorry but I don’t care. It was one of my favorites of 2021 and not enough people read it and it is so good?? Different media, multiple POVs, extremely queer, such a good exploration of fandom, some gender stuff, some romance stuff, some friendship stuff… I don’t know how to gush about this book any more than I already do.

Battle of the Bands ed. by Lauren Gibaldi and Eric Smith - This anthology is so much fun, and so impressive??? It’s a frame anthology, so everything is part of the same story, and there are just so many different approaches to music and relationships ways to embrace it all. My personal favorite story was Jenn Marie Thorne’s (who also happens to have written Night Music, a book I lent to my sister only to have her proclaim it “Spectacular”), but there’s so much to love throughout.

Let Me Hear a Rhyme by Tiffany Jackson - One of my absolute favorite auto-buy authors, Jackson took a Weekend at Bernie’s concept, set it among rappers in late-90s Brooklyn, and just…absolutely kicked my ass with it. It’s thrilling, sad, funny, and a great throwback all at once.

Girls in the Moon by Janet McNally - Another book I really just cannot rave about enough, and as a huge Nirvana fan, I loved that the vibe of this book felt like “The Frances Bean Story.” It’s so good, so deftly written, and I particularly highly recommend it to fans of Kathleen Glasgow’s Girl in Pieces, which is another YA I think is just fantastic. I really, really love the way it looks at where we come from in terms of parents’ histories, and particularly back when I read it, there were so few YAs that did that.

Spin by Lamar Giles - I just really, really love this enemies-to-friends mystery about a murdered DJ. The voices and pacing are great, and it dips into fandom, the dark web, and social justice, and if you already know what a huge fan of Giles’s work I am, you’ll know how much it means that my expectations were exceeded.

Three Day Summer by Sarvenaz Tash - I mean. It’s Woodstock. There’s a cameo by Greil Marcus, among others. It’s delightful. What more can I possibly say.

No, this isn’t all-inclusive by any stretch of the imagination, but that’s because I have lots of other, more specific music rec posts planned. You’ll just have to stick with me!